


Anywhere the Wind Blows (Doesn't Really Matter to Me)

by GoAwayOlivia



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: April 27th, Bruce Wayne is a Good Dad, Death Day Anniversary, Dissociation, Gen, depersonalization/derealization
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-28 11:01:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14447898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoAwayOlivia/pseuds/GoAwayOlivia
Summary: Sometimes he dissociates. He never sees it coming. He might have a couple of bad nights beforehand, but he has those all the time. They’re nothing special. But every now and then, when he’s not paying attention, his mind slips out of his body and he’s stuck drifting with nothing but the most fragile of strings connecting them. He can never seem to catch himself before it happens. One moment he’s present, cognizant. Then, it’s as if he blinks and suddenly he’s gone.This time, he really should have seen it coming.





	Anywhere the Wind Blows (Doesn't Really Matter to Me)

**Author's Note:**

> Just something for April 27th and the anniversary of Jason's death. RIP baby Jay. You deserved so much more than what you got. 
> 
> (And yes, the title is straight from Bohemian Rhapsody. Blame chibi_nightowl. She put the idea in my head, then I couldn't get it out. Not that there's anything wrong with Bohemian Rhapsody. I was raised on Queen.)

Sometimes he dissociates. He never sees it coming. He might have a couple of bad nights beforehand, but he has those all the time. They’re nothing special. But every now and then, when he’s not paying attention, his mind slips out of his body and he’s stuck drifting with nothing but the most fragile of strings connecting them. He can never seem to catch himself before it happens. One moment he’s present, cognizant. Then, it’s as if he blinks and suddenly he’s gone.

This time, he really should have seen it coming.

He doesn’t know how long it’s been, but he has the feeling far in the back of his mind that he’s been standing there in the light from the window for some time. The patch of light where his bare feet are is deep orange and angular. A few more minutes and it’ll shrink into nothing as the sun sets behind the buildings. It offers no warmth on his toes and distantly he wonders if it was warm earlier. Now he just feels a chill. He stares at his toes, wondering if they can tell him.

They don’t.

He blinks again and the sun is gone. His safe house is dark, only the street lights filtering through the windows offer any light. He turns and takes a step in the direction of the couch. His mind feels foggy, his thoughts slow and circular. His limbs feel both too heavy and like air. Like he has to think just a little too hard to get them to move, yet they feel as if they’ll just float away if he’s not focused on them.

He glances at his hands and is almost startled at the sight of them. He’s not sure what he expected, but somehow, they aren’t familiar. They’re not his hands. They are, but they’re not. Not real. Is this real? Is he?

He takes a breath and the disconnect grows just a little more. He feels separate from himself. Like he’s floating in the air above his body and with every breath he drifts just a little far away. There’s not enough air. It’s too heavy and too thin. Not enough oxygen present. The only thing he feels—the only thing that feels real, is the constricting feeling around his lungs. He needs more air. He needs—

Another breath and the panic he’d been mustering slips away. There’s not enough air, but his body breathes slowly anyway.

He’s sitting on the couch. Across the room, a shadow moves. By the time he fixates his attention, Batman is already standing above him. He lifts his eyes up, but they fall back down before they reach his face. There’s not enough energy to get them that high. It’s fine though. The Bat’s no more real than he is.

He kneels down, but Jason doesn’t pay him any attention. He takes another breath, stares at the floor several feet away, ignoring the hand that comes across his vision. It touches his face slowly, gently. Jason can barely feel it even as he tilts his head up. His eyes meet Bruce’s, not the white lenses of Batman. They’re blue and dark and Jason blinks and loses focus. Bruce or Batman, it doesn’t matter. None of them are real. Nothing in this room is real.

A glass of water presses into his hand. Jason blinks at it, mildly surprised. Bruce is kneeling in front of him again, but this time, the armor is gone. He’s in sweatpants and a t-shirt. Both the tiniest bit too small for him. It’s funny, he thinks distantly. He can’t remember the last time he saw Bruce in anything but armor or a suit.

When Jason doesn’t do anything but grip the glass of water, Bruce’s hand prompts his, raising it. He takes a sip. He can’t feel the water going down, but he must drink it because suddenly Bruce is pulling an empty glass from his hand. He sits on the couch beside him and Jason stares down at his hand—the way Bruce’s grips it. He can barely feel it on his skin and suddenly Jason wishes Bruce would squeeze—that he would just grip so tightly everything inside would snap so he could _feel_ it. Could _know_ it’s _his_ hand. Connected to _his_ body.

But Bruce doesn’t, and Jason drifts a little more away.

There’s light on the floor in front of his window again. Soft but there. Jason looks down at the bare toes on the floor in front of him and thinks he’d rather be standing in the patch of light. He isn’t quite sure how to get there though.

A mug of something dark and steaming presses into his hands. He looks at it vaguely, stares at the fingers wrapping his around it. It’s ever so slightly warm, he thinks. While the rest of him feels cold, the hands attached to his body feel that little bit of warmth. He stares as the steam rises from the mug in soft wisps. It smells of spice.

He comes back slowly, unable to focus on anything but the growing heat under his fingers. One second everything is silent, and then there’s sound. Traffic on the street outside, a siren in the distance, the sound of water rushing through the pipes as his upstairs neighbor takes a shower, the electrical hum of the building in the background. The mug in his hands isn’t just warm, it’s _hot_. Not burning, but hot enough that he’s shocked he didn’t notice before.

Then it’s like the snap of a rubber band.

Jason jolts and jerks away from the couch, and it’s only Bruce’s quick reflexes that keeps the mug of tea from spilling and shattering on the floor. Jason bolts to the window, panic thrumming under his skin like a livewire. He can’t leave, but he can’t stay still. Not now. He paces frantically, hands shaking as he takes too quick breaths.

“Jason,” Bruce is speaking, calm and solid. Like an anchor. But the frenetic energy inside him just spikes. Bruce was _here_. Bruce _saw_. And now, now he’s never going to let him be the Red Hood. Not in his city where he can put a stop to it. Because he _saw_. He saw how not right Jason is and now he has the perfect excuse. He’s going to take it all away and he just _can’t_!

Strong arms wrap around his shoulders and waist, strong like steel bars. He’s pulled against Bruce’s chest and for a second he almost fights, but Bruce is warm and his body blocks out some of the light, some of the sound that’s almost overwhelming now. “It’s okay. It’s okay, Jason. You’re safe,” Bruce’s voice rumbles deeply, and in that moment, it almost sounds _true_. “Breathe with me,” he tells him, and Jason does.

The frenzy dies down, but though he’s more in control, he feels no less panicked. And Bruce must pick up on that because he asks, “What do you need?”

He’s speaking before he makes the conscious decision. “I can’t be here,” Jason says vehemently. “I can’t. I need to get out. Get me out.”

“Where do you need to go?” Bruce asks, tone deathly serious. So serious, Jason can’t help but answer honestly.

“Somewhere hot. Somewhere _scorching_. Somewhere with _air._ ”

“Okay,” Bruce says, releasing him. He guides Jason back to the couch and he almost protests, but Bruce presses the mug of still hot tea back into his hands. “Give me a few minutes and I’ll take care of it,” he promises, eyes locked on Jason’s intently.

Something inside of him unwinds just a little. “Fine.”

He sips the tea and it’s strong as hell and bitter too. Like Bruce made it purposefully that way to try and coax Jason’s senses out from hiding. He doesn’t think he loses any more time, but Bruce exits Jason’s room with a packed duffel bag so quickly, he’s not really sure.

“Come on,” he says gently, helping Jason up from the couch. He doesn’t let go of his arm as they head out the door and down the many flights of stairs. It’s grounding.

When they exit the building, there’s a car on the street and Jason idly wonders how and when it got there. As Bruce guides him to it, he straightens up, ready to force himself to focus for as long as it takes him to get out of Gotham. To get somewhere he could _breathe_. But Bruce guides him to the passenger seat and gets behind the wheel before Jason can protest.

“What are you doing?”

“Going with you,” he says simply. Then adds when Jason continues to stare, “I can be gone for a couple of days.”

His jaw clenches and as always there are things Bruce isn’t saying. With the tightness around his mouth, the way his hands clench around the steering wheel and the shattered look behind his eyes, Jason thinks he hears them anyway.

 _I don’t want to be here either._ _I hate this day too. I can’t do this another year alone._

Any other time, Jason would bristle and argue, snarl and hurl words like daggers. But now he’s tired. He died. And just maybe it’s possible that the only person it hurt as much as him is sitting in the car next to him.

He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t get out of the car either. Bruce drives.

There’s an airplane and another car before they reach their destination. Jason doesn’t lose time, but he’s not really paying attention either. He sits by the window and watches the clouds pass, then watches the scenery go by once Bruce has him in the second car. He doesn’t ask where they are, doesn’t ask where they’re going. He just breathes in the air that isn’t Gotham. Looks at the sky that isn’t cloudy and full of death.

It’s hours from when Bruce led him out of his apartment that morning to when Bruce slows the car in front of some secluded fancy beachside villa. It’s huge yet tasteful and artfully surrounded by palm trees, but Jason ignores it completely and walks past to where he can see sand. He ditches the shoes he has no memory of putting on and walks straight to the water. The sand is hot beneath his feet and the sun beats down on him, soaking into his dark jeans from a sky that’s so blue it almost hurts to look at. In front of him, the water is clear and endless. And there’s _so much air_. He takes an easy breath and revels in the rush of oxygen to his lungs. He can breathe. Finally.

The tension eases out of his muscles with each breath, and he’s suddenly exhausted. He drops where he is, just lays out in the sand, lets the sun beat down on him, warming his body all the way through.

“You’re going to get sunburned like that,” Bruce says above him, and it might be his imagination, but he thinks Bruce sounds like he’s breathing easier too.

Jason lazily waves him off, unconcerned. The man hums thoughtfully. “I can probably find an umbrella inside. There should be food in the fridge too. Think you could eat?”

“Sure,” Jason answers drowsily. As long as he doesn’t have to move from this spot and as long as Bruce makes it quick. As long as he’s warm, as long as he can breathe, then he’ll be fine.

Stretched out on the beach, Bruce sits beside him to keep watch, and Jason closes his eyes, content.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on Tumblr: https://comebackolivia.tumblr.com/


End file.
